Participation

"I will pour out my Spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
your old men will dream dreams,
your young [women] will see visions."
Joel 2:28

After class on Saturday, my husband and I rushed over to the Moore Theater for the kids poetry slam. Our god-daughter and her sister were in a play. Well, it wasn't just any play, it was a play written by our god-daughter! (Yes, we are very proud.)

They performed the play three times so that each child could participate in a different way--acting, props management, lights, stage directing, etc. There were moments of brilliance and moments of chaos (they had only practiced for a week!) but overall it was really good and enjoyable.

And I couldn't help but think of Annie Dillard's "Expedition to the Pole." We are like the kids up on stage, delivering lines (sometimes audibly), pushing around unmanageable props, standing around (out of character) waiting for the next line of the story to take place. What is important is that we are up on stage and are participating. We are in the midst of the action--sometimes via the control room (is that a metaphor for the role of the pastor, shining light on the action?). We so want to be perfect and wonderful, but really we just bumble along. However, our bumbling activity is a joy to observe. Every time I see my friends' children on stage I love them (my friends and their children) more . They are putting themselves out there, they are growing creatively and they are participating.

I can't help but think that God loves us all the more for being on-stage, participating in the mystery that is the redeemed life. We (in the church) are the Keystone cops, the dancing bears, the guitars players, the singers of songs. We dream dreams and sing our songs. And somehow, it is what we are meant to be and do.

Peace,
Chelle

We are the music-makers,
And we are the dreamers of dreams,
Wandering by lone sea-breakers,
And sitting by desolate streams.
World-losers and world-forsakers,
Upon whom the pale moon gleams;
Yet we are the movers and shakers,
Of the world forever, it seems.

from "Ode" by
Arthur O'Shaughnessy

Love by George Herbert

Love bade me welcome: yet my soul drew back,

Guilty of dust and sin.

But quick-eyed Love, observing me grow slack

From my first enter in.

Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning,

If I lacked anything.

A guest, I answered, worthy to be here:

Love said, You shall be (s)he.

I the unkind, ungrateful? Ah my dear,

I cannot look on thee.

Love took my hand, and smiling did reply,

Who made the eyes but I?

Truth Lord, but I have marred them: let my shame

Go where it doth deserve.

And know you not, says Love, who bore the blame?

My dear, then I will serve.

You must sit down, says Love, and taste my meat:

So I did sit and eat.

From George Herbert, Oxford University Press, 1994

Order for Presentations

Don't forget to bring something to share for lunch tomorrow, even if it is just sandwiches cut up or something like that. (or a bag of chips) I'm bringing a simple salad, because that is what is in my fridge.

Here is the order for the presentations tomorrow morning. I tried to mix it up in a fairly random manner. We'll flow with time, depending on the presentation. If you have images to hang, please come a little early. 15 to 10 mins. will do.

(Catherine, we'll be improvisational with your presentation. Why don't we incorporate your presentation with lunch?)

1. Jessi
2. Shannon
3. Phil
4. Daniel
5. Alex
6. Karen
7. Andy
8. Mark
9. Kirsten
10. Mike
11. Buzz
12. Vangie
13. Josué
14. Kae
15. Cabe
16. Naomi
17. Austin & John

If you want to trade spaces with someone, feel free. I think that before we start the presentations, we'll spend some time looking at the visual offerings.

I look forward to tomorrow!

Peace,
Chelle

Lectures

Here are the lectures from today. Let me know if you would be interested in the slides from Dave's lectures.

The Artistic Impulse

On Story

-Chelle

Artistic Presentations

I wanted to put up a quick word about your upcoming artistic presentations. Just like in any master's level class, I assume that what you present on Saturday has been prepared for this class, it is not a pre-existent work. It definitely cannot have been used for another class.

I was thinking last night that I never said this explicitly to y'all in class, though it is implicit in graduate school in general.

If this is a problem, please let me know!!

-Chelle

Luci Shaw

Here are some quotes and poem from Luci Shaw's essay, "Beauty and the Creative Impulse," in The Christian Imagination, Leland Ryken, ed, Colorado Springs, CO: Shaw Books, 2002:

"Beauty is there to be noticed. Too often it is taken for granted because we are moving too fast to let it in and allow it to deliver its message in us. We need to pay attention. To show indifference to beauty is an insult to its Creator." (90)

Earlier in the same essay she talks about "a prairie woman in 1870 who wrote in her diary a note about her quilt-making: 'I make them warm to keep my family from freezing; I make them beautiful to keep my heart from breaking.' " (88) Shaw continues, "God made us human beings in his image; we participate in creative intelligence, giftedness, originality. We each have the faculty of imagination deep within us, waiting, like a seed, to be watered and fertilized. Imagination gives us pictures by which to see things the way they can be, or the way they are, underneath. The prairie woman, hemmed into her sod house with her small children by months of sub-zero cold and snow, used her imagination redemptively. Around the traditional quilt patterns--double stars, wedding rings--her imagination pieced in the exuberant flowers and leaves that redeemed the long winter, that brought her soul back to life. She created beauty and richness from the ordinary stuff, even the castoffs, of her life." (90)

Quilt-Maker (89)

To keep a husband and five children warm,
she quilts them covers thick as drifts against
the door. Through every fleshy square white threads
needle their almost invisible tracks; her hours
count each small suture that hold together
the raw-cut, uncolored edges of her life.

She pieces each one beautiful and summer bright
to thaw her frozen soul. Under her fingers
the scraps grow to green birds and purple
improbalble leaves; deeper than calico, her mid-winter
mind bursts into flowers. She watches them unfold
between the double stars, the wedding rings.

(from Polishing the Petoskey Stone, Shaw Books, 1990, 33)

R.S. Thomas

Because we cannot be clever and honest
and are inventors of things more intricate
than the snowflake -- Lord have mercy.

Because we are full of pride
in our humility, and because we believe
in our disbelief -- Lord have mercy.

Because we will protect ourselves
from ourselves to the point
of destroying ourselves -- Lord have mercy.

And because on the slope to perfection,
when we should be half-way up,
we are half-way down -- Lord have mercy.

"Kyrie" from Mass for Hard Times by R.S. Thomas

Questions about Papers and Projects?

Let me know if you have any questions about your projects for this upcoming weekend. ALSO, let me know if you have any special needs or requirements. On Friday let me know what you are doing for your Saturday presentation, if you have any specific needs (space, etc.) and the length of your presentation.

Peace,
Chelle

Art Exhibit at John Knox Church

There is an exhibit at John Knox Presbyterian Church in Burien entitled "Seeing the Savior". This exhibit is sponsored by Christians in the Visual Arts [CIVA]. It sounds like the art is well worth the trip to Normandy Road! Artists include Edward Knippers, John August Swanson and Joan Bohlig, so it should be a very high quality and interesting show.

The exhibit goes until the end of July. Plan your trip now! Maybe you could stop on your way to Tacoma?

See the JKPC website for directions.

Peace,
Chelle

"Crucifixion: The Sixth Hour" by Bruce Herman

Tacoma Art Museum

I just heard about an exhibit down at the Tacoma Art Museum: "Illuminating the Word: The Saint John's Bible".

I don't know if you have heard about this project, but it is the first handwritten and illuminated manuscript to be commissioned and completed in 500 years. An ecumenical and multi-faith panel of theologians were consulted as they interpreted Scripture through visual image.

In addition, there is Janet Cardiff's installation piece based on Thomas Tallis' motet, Spem in Alium. A great example of capaciousness in musical space!!

So, a two-for-one experience in theological art. How can you resist?

Both exhibits are there until Sept. 7, 2008.

Peace,
Chelle

A Poem for the Foodies

Delight

Let the meal be simple. A big plate
of mussels, warm bread with garlic,
and enough mulled wine to celebrate

Being here. I open a hinged mussel
pincering a balloon of plump meat
from the blue angel wings of a shell.

A table's rising decibels of fun.
Such gossip. A story caps a story.
Banter. Then, another pun on a pun.

Iced yoghurt snipes at my temples.
My tongue matches a strawberry's heart
with its rough skin of goose-pimples.

Conversations fragment. Tete-a-tete,
a confidence passes between two guests.
A much of oatcake thickens my palate.

Juicy fumes of a mango on my breath.
(A poem with no end but delight.)
I knife to the oblong host of its pith.

Wine sinks its ease to the nerve-ends.
Here are my roots. I feast on faces.
Boundless laughter. A radiance of friends.

by Micheal O'Siadhail, from A Fragile City

pat the puppy

Last night I had a 'pat the puppy' moment (a la Dillard). My husband and I took advantage of the gorgeous weather and went to Greenlake to hear a friend's bluegrass band. They didn't do anything special, they just set up alongside the path down from the Bathhouse Theater.

The music was perfect for such a lazy, summer evening--I just love that old-timey harmony! I sat back, listened to the music, watched the people, watched the dogs, watched the people with their dogs (lots of dogs) and observed people's reactions to the music. For one thing, the band was really good. When you are walking around Greenlake, you don't expect randomly to come across a good bluegrass band. So, people would stop and stand. Then they would move closer.Then they would sit down. Of course, there were those who started to dance, but that never lasted long. This was an experience of listening. The audience came and went, but everyone who went by seemed delighted and surprised by a random act of beauty. Serendipity! (According to Websters: "finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for.")

This moment of joy and discovery disappeared almost as soon as I noticed it, but I was there, under the fading blue sky of a warm Seattle evening listening to music; content with the world.

How do these moments happen? Random beauty surrounds us yet we rarely stop to notice. We have no ears to hear or eyes to see. We just don't have the time, or don't take the time to truly live ("indwell") where we are.

A few years ago, Joshua Bell, one the great violinists of our time, participated in a little experiment about random beauty. A reporter in Washington thought it would be great to set up Bell as a busking violinist in a DC subway during rush hour. They were worried that they might cause a scene and were prepared for crowds and a bit of chaos. What they were not prepared for was indifference. Only about 2 people stopped (out of over 1,000). One had recently heard him play a concert. Indifference rather than serendipity. Random beauty ignored.

I don't know if there is really anything we can learn from this. We all have our moments of 'noticing'. However, if we don't ignore something at one time or another, then we would be overwhelmed by it all--not just the beauty. "How could any human being endure such ravishment of the senses, every hour of every day for many winters and summer?" But if we don't look, hear and touch, how will we ever 'pat the puppy'?

In the meantime, all we can do is prepare ourselves for a great music, so that we will be ready to play (and/or listen) when the time comes.

Serendipity to you!
Chelle

If you are interested in following up on the Joshua Bell story, here are a couple of links to articles:

• "Pearls Before Breakfast"
• "Too Busy to Stop for the Music"

Want to go see a play?

There is a play this next Sunday night at the Fremont Abbey. It is not a "Christian play", although the actor, Chris John Domig, is a Christian. There will be a reception after the play for anyone that would like to talk to Chris. Evidently he is very approachable and enjoys talking about what it means to be a Christian in the arts. (Well, it sounds like he likes to talk...) The reception will also include a number of Seattlites who are active in the local arts scene. I think this is a great oppotunity for anyone interested in talking with people who are vocational actors and artists.

The play, "Dirt", is about racisim, exclusion and "the other" in the US using the experience of an Iraqi in New York as the story's subject. Tickets are $10 online and $14 at the door. The info is below. Let me know if you would like to go.

-Chelle

Schoenberg and Schopenhauer

I want to share a couple of my favorite quotes from Schoenberg.

From his essay, "My Evolution":

• "One must not forget that—theory or no theory—a composer’s only yardstick is his sense of balance and his belief in the infallibility of the logic of his musical thinking.”
  

Here is his "Aphorism of 1910":

• "Art is the cry of distress uttered by those who experience at firsthand the fate of mankind. Who are not reconciled to it, but come to grips with it. Who do not apathetically wait upon the motor called ‘hidden forces’, but hurl themselves in among the moving wheels, to understand how it all works. Who do not turn their eyes away, to shield themselves from emotions, but open them wide, so as to tackle what must be tackled. Who do, however, often close their eyes, in order to perceive things incommunicable by the senses, to envision within themselves the process that only seems to be the world outside. The world revolves within—inside them: what bursts out is merely the echo—the work of art!"

From his essay, "Problems with Teaching Art":

• "So the genius really learns only from himself, the man of talent mainly from others. The genius learns from nature—his own nature—the man of talent from art."

From his essay, "Composition with Twelve-Tones":

• "Form in the arts, and especially in music, aims primarily at comprehensibility. The relaxation which a satisfied listener experiences when he can follow an idea, its development, and the reasons for such development is closely related, psychologically speaking, to a feeling of beauty. Thus, artistic value demands comprehensibility, not only for intellectual, but also for emotional satisfaction. However, the creator’s idea has to be presented, whatever the mood he is impelled to evoke."

Schoenberg, in his Theory of Harmony, discussing the role of a specific 'dissonant' chord within musical form, and how this chord lost its luster:

• “[the diminished seventh chord] was the ‘expressive’ chord of that time. Whenever one wanted to express pain, excitement, anger, or some other strong feeling—there we find, almost exclusively, the diminished seventh chord. So it is in the music of Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Weber, etc. Even in Wagner’s early works it plays the same role. But soon the role was played out. This uncommon, restless, undependable guest, here today, gone tomorrow, settled down, became a citizen, was retired a philistine. The chord had lost the appeal of novelty, hence, it had lost its sharpness, but also its luster. It had nothing more to say to a new era. Thus, it fell from the higher sphere of art music to the lower of music for entertainment. There it remains, as a sentimental expression of sentimental concerns. It became banal and effeminate. Became banal! It was not so originally. It was sharp and dazzling. Today, though, it is scarcely used any more except in that mawkish stuff (Schmachtliteratur) which sometime later always apes what was formerly, in great art, an important event. Other chords took its place, chords that were to replace its expressiveness and chords that were to replace its pivotal facility. These were the augmented triad, certain altered chords, and some sonorities that, having already been introduced in the music of Mozart or Beethoven by virtue of suspensions or passing tones, appeared in that of Wagner as independent chords. None of these chords, however, was quite the equal of the diminished seventh—an advantage for them, actually; for they were thus better protected against banality, since they were not open to such excessive use. Yet, these too were soon worn out, soon lost their charm; and that explains why so quickly after Wagner, whose harmonies seemed unbelievably bold to his contemporaries, new paths were sought: The diminished seventh chord provoked this movement, which cannot stop before it has fulfilled the will of nature, and not before we have reached the greatest possible maturity in the imitation of nature: so that we can then turn away from the external model and more and more toward the internal, toward the one within us.”

Here is a quote from Schoenberg's good friend, Wassily Kandinsky in his book, Concerning the Spiritual in Art:

• "there has never been a time when the arts approached each other more nearly than they do today…In each manifestation is the seed of a striving towards the abstract, the non-material. Consciously or unconsciously [the arts] are obeying Socrates’ command—Know thyself. Consciously or unconsciously artists are studying and proving their material, setting in the balance the spiritual value of those elements…A painter, who finds no satisfaction in mere representation, however artistic, in his longing to express his inner life, cannot but envy the ease with which music, the most non-material of the arts today, achieves this end."

The philosopher, William Benjamin on Schoenberg:

• “Schoenberg made his radical break with musical tradition in 1908, full of confidence in his intuitive powers—his ear for unorthodox pitch combinations and his instinct for rhythm and form—and with the conviction that he was genuinely inspired, that he was composing as if under the compulsion of some mysterious (inner) force…that inspiration is the beginning and end of authentic artistry.”

And, finally, Arthur Schopenhauer, in his The World as Will and Representation, on the role investigation of the inner world of the self plays in our knowledge of the external world:

• "we ourselves are also among those realities or entities we require to know, that we ourselves are the thing-in-itself. Consequently, a way from within stands open to us to that real inner nature of things to which we cannot penetrate from without. It is, so to speak, a subterranean passage, a secret alliance, which, as if by treachery, places us all at once in the fortress that could not be taken by attack from without."

• My note on Schopenhauer: Schopenhauer's claim is that knowledge of the self leads to knowledge of the “real inner nature of things” because the only source of immediate knowledge available to us is the self. This is a curving in toward the self to gain knowledge about the inner essence of the world, and God (if there is a transcendent category); that knowledge of the self actually provides a secret passage into the deeper mysteries of the world—the self, in Schopenhauer's model and Schoenberg's after him, is incurvatus in se.

The Arnold Schoenberg Center has a great website, if you are interested in looking at his other paintings. They also have most of his music available to listen to:

• http://www.schoenberg.at/default_e.htm

I'll play some of Schoenberg's music in our next class session to give you a feel for his construal of tonality and musical form and unity.

Peace,
Chelle

Who Are we?

We started today with an examination of God's triune being. Our creative being is somehow informed by our being created in God's image. Even more so, Christ's incarnation forms us as Christians and as artists.

Tomorrow we will talk about this more indepth and, hopefully, share stories and learn to really see, touch and hear together. I'm hoping for some storytelling and, eventually, ravioli.

Here is the story that I read in class:

• http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dpq235b_2dz4qqcpk

Here's a link to my lecture on trinitarian theology:

• http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dpq235b_0chw8gmgn

Here is one of the lectures for tomorrow:

• http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dpq235b_1dn4q37c5

Peace,
Chelle